Saturday, June 8, 2013

Day 3 ...off to Duncan..Joing the" Greybeard Great Adventure" #3

A lousy night last night. A loud wild party on our hotel floor. About 2:30 AM, woke us both up. We called the front desk, they called the cops. Outside was a OKC Party bus, many people all over the parking lot, and severl very loud ones right down the hall from us. The cops finally got them all to leave and things were quite again. We are both tired today.
 It was a short 70 miles to Dons place, had a great BBQ dinner, meet the others of the group. Traveling down the interstate I caught a pea size rock in the forhead thrown from a late model full fendered Gran Prix...that hurt!! No damage, no blood, just sore for a while. The rest of the trip will now be known as "The Greybeard Great Adventure #3" They all have tops...all but us. There is a 56 Chevy, 40 Ford coupe, 34 roadster, 32 3window, a couple of deuce roadstesr (with tops) and our rpu. We are leaving at 7AM in the morning....off to Albuquerque. Don made some red windshield strips stating the Greybeard Adventure #3, fun.
We stopped at OKC Classic Ford parts this morning and purchased a few little parts for the panel project. We also found a car wash and gave the rpu a nice bath, had to look good for the new friends!!

Friday, June 7, 2013

Day 2.......OKC

We left KC about 9, only 350 miles to OKC, I missed calculated yesterday.Rodney knew of a retro store in OKC, turns out it was only about 7 miles from the hotel. We stopped there first. A neat little store with cool 60 and 70's stuff. He found some neat dishes made a deal and off to FedEx we went. Had them pack them good and ship to home. No room in the RPU! Tonight we had a great dinner in bricktown, a great Mexican place,,awesome food and double awesome margaritas. A fun time. Tommorrow its about 70 miles to Don's place for a BBQ dinner and meet the rest of the group. Then Sunday morning its down the road like a bunch of greybearded old guys in hotrods heading west.

Thursday, June 6, 2013

Day one......Kansas City

I left home at 6:30, drove to Mpls to pick up son Rodney and onto Lakeville to meet up with Greg.As we were pulling out Greg's clutch gave up!!  Damn!! He took it home and Rodney and I continued. As I left home it was foggy, the more I drove the wetter the fog got, turned into light rain . It dried up south of Lakeville, stayed cloudy but dry all the way. We stopped in Des Moines for lunch with friend Dave. Toured his deuce garage, had a great lunch and a good time.
We made it to the hotel about 7PM, a long day, spent too long in Des Moines but was worth it, we didn't really have a schedule anyways. Tomorrow its off to OKC...500 miles also.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Topless Tour starts Thursday AM

The Buick is at Fat Joe's race shop being repaired, new axle, brakes,repair the housing...will be all good soon. In the morning I leave here at 6AM ' pick up son Rodney in Mpls, and meet friend Greg in his roadster in Lakeville about 8AM and then it is off to Des Moines for lunch with friend Dave and onto KC for the night. The fun is about to begin!!

Monday, June 3, 2013

near disaster for the Buick

After a good breakfast at a neat little cafe in  town we headed for Mitchell SD. We made a reservation at the Holiday Inn there. Our schedule showed we would arrive about 5PM. Just 10 miles west of Mitchell while driving in a single lane construction zone, the left rear axle broke. We were driving east about 70 mph, when it broke we went skidding sideways down the lane vering towards the oncoming lane and doing a full 180 degree turn before coming to a stop in the opposite lane facing west!! Wow what a ride!! I cought my breathe, opened the door and got out. A car pulled up right behind us, sure glad he was not there 2 minutes ago. Two kids and a man helped me push the car to the side so the lane would not be blocked any longer. I can't believe we skidded like that and spun around 180 degrees and did no other damage to the car. I called AAA and ordered a flatbed, then called 911 for assistance from the law, we were just inches off of thr far right line, big trucks were whizzing by us just inches away, we could not get the car any farther off of the lane. The sherriff arrived in a few minutes then finally the flatbead got there. Seemed like an hour but was only about 35 minutes. We got it drug up on the flat bed and headed for thre hotel. I called my good friend Lumpy and asked him if he could come in the morning with his trailer and truck. He should be here about noon. Hopefully we can wench it onto his trailer and head for home. 400 miles to go.  The small rear wheel well opening kept the tire inside the well, otherwise it would have flown somewhere out in the ditch. The right rear hubcap flew off and landed in the ditch, I retrived it and tossed it into the trunk.
My good luck continues......yes a problem, but could have been so much worse!!  If those west bound cars were just seconds closer we would have crashed head on into them, if the axle would have broken a few miles earlier when we were crusing at 80, who knows what would have happened. If it broke earlier this morning when we were driving across the Indian Reservation...we would still be there waiting for help.....no phone service and very little traffic.  Never a dull momment on a trip.

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Pics for the Buick trip

Some pics for the Buick trip...............................

The Deuceguy takes a Buick trip

We left Wednesday about noon to drive to my old home town of Alliance, NE. My 50th high school reuninon is happening May 31 and June 1. The local car club is also having their 13th annual car show...how convenient. Since I drove my high school 32 coupe to the 40th reunion I thought it was fitting to drive the 50 Buick to the 50th.
We got no more than 20 miles from home when the skies opened up and piured rain for the next half hour or so. Oh well the car wont melt and its been wet before. As we drove into Pipestone, MN the Buick developed a terrible miss, would hardly run, black smoke, shaking....what the heck?? I pulled the plugs, all black off course...its running very rich. I thought it might be a speck of dirt in the carb, that happened before as few years back. I tried to suck it thru by reving it up and then choking it off with my hands till it almost dies......no luck. It was just about 5 o'clock, I decided I needed help before everything is closed up. I found a small repair shop just a block away. I approached the guy there, told him of my problem. He came out to the car to check it out. I pulled the plugs, he went inside and blasted them all clean, put them back in and no change. After about an hour ans a half we discovered the secondaries were stuck open. No wonder it was burning rich!! Not sure why they stuck but sure runs better when closed!! We were off again by 6PM on tne way to Mitchell, SD.
We arrived in Mitchell by 8:30 at the hotel just minutes before the skies opened again.
The next morning we headed for hometown.
Just out of town is an unique rest area, I hope to attach a photo. We also checked out the famous Car Henge.
The class reunion was fun. Nice to see old classmates. Many I have not seen for 50 years.
Saturday/Sunday was the car show...lots of fu, lots of nice comments on the "Fine Wine" Buick. We won first in class, and Long Distance...bought me a full tank of gas!! I was told our car received the most votes of any car of all of the last 13 shows...that was pretty cool. We are on the way home in the morning...I leave Thursday AM for LARS in California in the RPU.